[7]
Just as
river-currents are more violent when they run along a
sloping bed, that presents no obstacles to check their
course, than when their waters are broken and baffled
by rocks that obstruct the channel, so a style which
flows in a continuous stream with all the full development of its force is better than one which is rough
and broken. Why then should it be thought that
polish is inevitably prejudicial to vigour, when the
truth is that nothing can attain its full strength
[p. 511]
without the assistance of art, and that art is always
productive of beauty?
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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